Columns

Hardly a day goes by that we don’t hear about the dire consequences of climate change and the impending doom it will bring on the planet and all of mankind. Heat trapping gases created by our reliance on and addiction to fossil-fuel energy sources are raising the temperatures in our oceans and our atmosphere, melting ice caps throughout the polar regions, and causing extreme weather patterns all over the globe.

As a physician, I know that when you have a cure for an ailment, you use it. You don’t waste time, because you know that delay only makes the condition worse. New Mexico has a problem. We’re at the bottom of nearly every indicator of child well-being. We know what works and we’re actually giving the right medicine to a few lucky kids. But most are not getting the cure, even though we know it works and we have the resources to get it to them.

Happy 238th Birthday, America! It’s also the birthday of the Federal Freedom of Information Act, which appropriately was born on the Fourth of July in 1966. We hope all Americans — Republicans, Democrats and independents — will observe this day by remembering the values that unite rather than divide us.

Born in 1837, Eugenio Romero was two years younger than his brother Trinidad. In 1882 he was elected the first and only mayor of the combined city of east and west Las Vegas, before the eastside broke away and established itself as a separate municipality. (Don Eugenio alone held this distinction for almost 90 years, until the consolidation of our municipalities in 1970).

Compiled by The Associated Press
The Terre Haute Tribune-Star on the need for CASA volunteers (June 28, 2014):
If you agree that not much is sadder — and potentially more unsettling to our society — than a child torn from his or her home, here is a way you can make a difference, one kid at a time.

HALLSTATT, Austria — We’re a number of kilometers from the spot I thought we’d be on this day, but the pleasant weather makes us regret nothing at all. As we left Las Vegas for our summer trip overseas, that took us from Albuquerque, to Dallas, to London, then to Prague, in the Czech Republic. I expected to be in Salzburg today, savoring every note Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart ever wrote.

Editor’s note: Baillie Kujath, Yalda Barlas and Myra Murillo, UNM BA/MD students, participated in a rural practicum this summer in Las Vegas. The students shadowed local rural physicians Dr. David Elliott, Dr. Thomas Strain and Dr. L. David Young and participated in weekly tutorial sessions at Luna Community College with UNM faculty member Sally Bachofer and community coordinator Elaine Luna. Baillie Kujath wrote this piece on behalf of the BA/MD students.

As concerns the next several columns in particular, I humbly acknowledge the scholarly writings of Ralph Emerson Twitchell, Lynn Perrigo and Maurilio Vigil, as well as the personal history imparted to me by Don Miguel Romero’s great-grandson, John Paul Taylor, and by my dear friend since childhood, Arabella Romero Aragón, Don Miguel’s great-great-granddaughter.

Kearney Hub on how student debt puts graduates in a deep hole (June 20):
Should college graduates be allowed to refinance their student loans at today’s lower market rates, as other borrowers can do for mortgages and consumer loans? That was the question posed last week in a student loan bill before the U.S. Senate.